Senior author Dr. Gordon Guyatt of McMaster University in Hamilton suggests the 10 percent to 15 percent of revenues for profits spend on shareholders and taxes could be used for patients. For example, the study suggests that of the estimated 80,000 U.S. nursing home residents who presently have bedsores — 7,000 cases may be attributable to for-profit ownership.

“The results are unequivocal and completely consistent with other studies comparing for-profit versus non-profit care,” Guyatt says in a statement. “It is time to base healthcare policy on evidence, not ideology.”